Marco Rubio to President Obama: We are still at war

The prisoner exchange to recover Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl shows President Barack Obama doesn’t take threats to U.S. national security seriously enough, Sen. Marco Rubio says in a new op-ed piece.

In a USA Today op-ed published Tuesday evening, the Florida Republican criticized the president for the deal to secure the release of Bergdahl in exchange for five senior Taliban members released from Guantánamo Bay prison.

Rubio argued that, with the deal, the Obama administration is “legitimizing the Taliban” and that its decision “may endanger the lives of Americans abroad, both military and civilian.”

The senator is one of many congressional Republicans that have attacked the White House for the agreement, with many saying the president has endangered national security by releasing the Taliban members and that Obama violated the law by not consulting Congress 30 days before the Guantánamo release.

A frequent critic of the administration’s foreign policy, the senator linked the Bergdahl decision with what he perceived as systemic administration failures, including Syria.

Rubio, a potential 2016 presidential candidate, concluded that the president was failing the U.S. with his foreign policy. “The American people deserve better than a president who refuses to speak honestly about the threats we face,” he said.